Monday, July 15, 2013

Blame States For Not Expanding Medicaid, Obama Adminstration Will Tell Poor Residents

Posted: 07/15/2013 12:41 pm EDT

The federal government wants poor residents of states not expanding
Medicaid under President Barack Obama's health care reform law to know
who's denying them health coverage -- and the administration has a plan
to make sure they find out.

The
health care reform law calls for Medicaid, the joint federal-state
health program for the poor, to be opened up to anyone who earns up to
133 percent of the federal poverty level, which is $15,282 for a single
person this year. But when the Supreme Court upheld Obamacare last year,
justices also ruled that states could opt out of the Medicaid
expansion. The result will be millions fewer poor U.S. residents gaining health coverage, mostly among adults without children.

Under the Obamacare law, the federal government will pay the full cost of
covering newly eligible people on Medicaid from 2014 to 2016, then will
gradually reduce its share of the funding until it reaches 90 percent
in 2022 and years following. The federal government currently pays an average of 57 percent of states' Medicaid expenses.

The
health insurance exchanges are online marketplaces where people who
don't get health benefits at work can compare health plan benefits and
costs, and learn whether they qualify for Medicaid or tax credits for
private insurance. The federal government will run the exchanges in 34 states, while 16 states and the District of Columbia will manage their own exchanges.

In
those states that didn't create exchanges, leaving the federal
government in charge, people whose income is below 133 percent of the
poverty level will see a notation explaining that their states declined to take up the Medicaid expansion that
would have covered them, the official said. The exact wording of the
notice hasn't been determined, and senior administration officials spoke
to reporters at the Eisenhower Executive Office Building adjacent to
the White House last week on the condition they not be named nor quoted.

The
health care reform law creates health insurance tax credits for people
at the poverty line up to four times the poverty line -- but not below
it. This means that those earning less than the poverty level -- $11,490
for an individual this year -- won't have access to these subsidies or
Medicaid if their home states don't expand the program. Because these
people will fall between the cracks, the Obama administration has exempted them from the law's individual mandate that most U.S. residents obtain health coverage next year.